47 Reasons Sane People Sell A House Dirt Cheap

Are you apprehensive about marketing to motivated sellers? Do you wonder whether people actually exist that are willing to sell their houses for dirt cheap without being forced?

Join the club. I think most of us have these doubts when we got started. It’s only natural because we’ve likely never been in a situation that would make us want to sell under market value.

The more marketing I did, the more it became clear that people were more than willing to happily sell their house for cheap. Amazingly, it was hardly ever because of a looming foreclosure.

In order to help people understand why sellers call investors to buy their houses, I’ve put together a list. This list is full of reasons and situations that people have that make them want to sell quickly and painlessly.

The list is broken up into two sections. The first are the ones related to situations where the seller didn’t ‘earn’ the equity. They didn’t pay on the house for 20 years and then need to sell. The second section contains negative situations that people end up in that cause them to be willing to give up some equity.

You could and should use this list to help in determining where to direct your marketing.

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This is by no means all of the situations and circumstances that cause people to sell for cheap. I’d like your help in coming up with more. If you have one that you could add, please mention it in the comments below. Let’s see how many we can get up to.

Also, let’s have a contest to get a 1,000 facebook likes on this article. Nothing’s impossible. If we’re going to go big, might as well go HUGE! Help us out, click the ‘like’ button.Photo: Barbara Piancastelli

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About Author

Danny Johnson (G+) is a real estate investor in San Antonio, TX. Visit his blog: Flipping Junkie – A House Flipping Blog to follow along with him as he shows, in detail, the marketing he is doing, the leads being generated, the lead and deal analysis, the rehabs and really, just about everything. He also provides real estate investor websites at LeadPropeller.com.

Here’s one that’s a landlord type situation, but does not seem to neatly fit into “tired landlord” or “not wanting to be a landlord”. This seller owned a townhome and his girlfriend at the time lived with him there. Then they moved out to a bigger place, and rented the townhome out to two of her friends. Then the seller broke up with the girlfriend, got a new girlfriend and wanted to sell the place to get some extra cash. However, he didn’t want to have to deal with removing the tenants and thus have the possibility of negative blowback from the ex-girlfriend. So he just wanted to sell for cash to someone and let them deal with kicking out the tenants. The place was in very good shape and (according to him) the tenants paid regularly and were very nice, he just didn’t want to have to deal with the ex at all. He was willing to take a HUGE reduction in price for that peace of mind.

Great list, Danny, and in these cases, the seller is not getting taken advantage of by the buyer, as some may claim . . . they are setting a low price because that’s how you sell items quickly. I’ve sold property dirt cheap for several of these reasons — in the end, it was both to my advantage to get out, and the advantage of the buyer to get in, knowing full well my reasons for unloading.

Happy to offer my $0.02 . . . what amazes me is when people complain about their property not selling — they can never figure out what it is. Of course, they never even consider that they aren’t priced correctly…

How about thin walls? Not just because of noisy neighboors but heavy street traffic that can be heard all the time. My friend bought a condo in Boca Raton FL and turned it into a furnished weekly beach rental shortly thereafter because she bought before they were finished building and didn’t anticipate the noise.

I object to the “drive-through society” characterization of the homeowner who decides to sell to a cash buyer. It’s not as if the seller is somehow lazy for choosing not to weather a stress-filled and uncertain retail marketing process. In my neighborhood are many elders who have raised their kids and maybe grandchildren in their homes over several decades. Maybe they have been maintaining the house but not necessarily updating it throughout, so their homes are not great candidates for the retail market. Then all of a sudden the elder resident needs to move due to a health issue, or some other vulnerability. It’s surely a difficult transition already, why should the seller choose the bumpier path? Chances are the seller will wind up selling to an investor anyway–but have to pay settlement costs plus 5-6% in agent commissions in the end.

I think what was meant was that some people do it for reasons that you suggested, but there are also times when a person really does just want to get cash as quickly as possible. It’s not to say that everyone that prefers to sell quickly just wants instant gratification. It’s to say that maybe some do.

Hi Nancy:
What you describe is definitely not “drive through mentality”! I’m talking about something entirely different.
We have had people walk away from HUGE amounts of equity for convenience.
They don’t want agents listing their house; they don’t want strangers walking through; they want to know exactly what day it will close so they can move on the day of their choice.
We give them that, the convenience they want, and they pay us well for it. These people are not in distress and are used to living with convenience. Buying at 60-70 cents on the dollar works in every price point and a property can be in pristine condition and still sell at those discounts. “Needing” to sell and “wanting” to sell are two very different conditions!

Wow, Danny! This is an awesome compilation. I love this kind of information because it reassures me that I’m not necessarily crazy for offering someone 20% of their property’s market value. I’ve encountered many of these same situations with the sellers I’ve worked with in the past, so it’s good to see that others have had similar experiences.